Treadmill exercise improved walking endurance for patients with PAD

Patients with peripheral arterial disease who participated in supervised treadmill exercise experienced improvements in walking endurance and quality of life.

Researchers conducted a randomized, controlled clinical trial to determine whether treadmill exercise and lower extremity resistance training improved functional performance among 156 patients with PAD, with and without intermittent claudication symptoms.

After six months of follow-up, supervised treadmill training improved six-minute walk performance by an average of 69 ft compared with the control group, whose distance decreased from baseline by an average of 49 ft. Lower extremity resistance training increased distance walked by 41 ft compared with the control group. However, six-minute walk performance was unchanged among patients in the resistance training group.

Researchers reported more favorable changes in brachial arterial flow–mediated dilation (1.53%) in the treadmill exercise group; however, there was no between-group difference for patients assigned to resistance training. Treadmill exercise (3.44 minutes; 95% CI, 2.05-4.84) and resistance training (1.90 minutes; 95% CI, 0.49-3.31) were associated with greater increases in average maximum treadmill walking time.

Further, treadmill exercise patients had greater average improvement in their 36-Item Short Form Health Survey physical functioning score (7.5; 95% CI, 0.00-15.0) and walking impairment distance score (10.7; 95% CI, 1.56-19.9). Resistance training patients experienced greater average improvement in their physical functioning score (7.5; 95% CI, 0.00-15.0), walking impairment distance (6.92; 95% CI, 1.07-12.8) and stair climbing scores (10.4; 95% CI, 0.00-20.8).

JAMA. 2009;301:165-174.